Trained To Kill

twenty five: i am fine.

My whole body freezes. His eyes are lifeless and still, looking right at me. Thick, crimson liquid starts pooling around his head, staining the floor. I reach out to touch him, to do something, but my hand is trembling so hard it barely moves. Due to the fact that my ears were ringing something serious, I couldn’t even hear myself screaming.

Matt’s next to me. He’s pulling me away from Jacob, even though by now my fingers have latched onto his shirt and refuse to let go. Matthew’s yelling something, but I can’t hear him. I can’t hear anything. The only thing I’m even aware of is Jacob’s dead eyes that seem to be locked on mine.

Dead.

Matthew adds force and pulls me away successfully, setting me down away from all the broken glass. My ears are still ringing, my heart is still threatening to beat out of my chest. Apparently, whatever shooting that was happening had stopped and the shooter(s) fled. This was a hit and run. Jake was the target.

Now, I’ve heard Matt refer to all of them as a “family” before, but I’d never really seen them act like one. In fact, the only thing I’ve seen them do is be hateful towards each other. All the time. But right before my very own eyes, at this moment, the family thing happens. Matt holds Jacob’s head from behind, his hands quickly becoming coated in blood. While he does that, Nicole puts her ear to his heart, checking to make sure its beating. Making sure he didn’t bleed out yet. Valencia has something in her hand, I glance at it through my tears and it’s a syringe that she’s sticking into his arm. They’re all saying things to one another, but I can’t hear anything over the ringing that fills my head.

My conscience wills me to go over there and do something to help, to stop being a pathetic piece of trash that’s absolutely useless to everyone. But I can’t move. I can’t do anything with those cold, dead eyes staring right at me. It registers in my brain that he’s not dead, that he’ll be okay.. but that doesn’t keep me from seeing the bullet hole in the middle of his head.

They all pick him up and drag him on the couch, Nicole running off to get something. She enters the kitchen and comes back with a towel. Both she and Valencia start tending to him and Matthew comes in my direction. His hands hold my arms and he pulls me up. “Come on, kitten.” He says softly and leads me up the stairs and into his room.

My body is still shaking, even when I’m curled up in a ball on the soft mattress. I don’t know what to think, don’t know what to say. The whole scene won’t stop playing through my head. Matthew’s behind me, stroking my hair, trying to tell me that he’ll be okay, but I don’t hear that. I just hear the sound of gun shots, the sound of glass breaking, the thud of his body hitting the floor.

God.

My chest tightens so much that it sucks the energy out of me, and I doze off.

--

I wake up in a cold sweat, because when I closed my eyes it only got worse. In a panic, I sit up. Was that real? Did that happen?

“Hey, Karma. How are you feeling?” A warm voice says from the corner of the room. I look over and Matt is sitting, watching me intently.

“Where… where is..”

“He’s still down. He’s healing.. slowly. It shouldn’t be more than a couple of hours til he wakes up, considering he’s stronger than the rest of us.”

The shooting did happen, Karma. And you witnessed it. Visions of the blood that was pouring out of his head flicker in my vision and I whimper and bury my head in the bed again, desperate to make them stop. If they don’t, I’m sure I’ll lose it. And I’m sick of breaking down in front of these people.